Pitchers and Catchers Report Tomorrow

February 13, 2009

Valentine’s Day is a little sweeter this year because it’s also the first day major league injured players, pitchers and catchers report to spring training, which means we can talk about baseball

“Spring Training Thankfully Arrives,” says the Wall Street Journal. amNY‘s Urbanite finds fans “hungry” for the new season. “It’ll take my mind off of the rest of the crap,” 71-year-old Mets fan Ed Lefkowitz tells them. They tell us the Yankees are favored 5-2 by “odds makers” to win the World Series, which will also sweeten for us their inevitable collapse.

Over at the Times Yankee fan Clyde Haberman also celebrates pitchers and catchers, but complains that “the Yankees have almost gone out of their way to make it hard to root for them.” His team “spent close to half a billion dollars to hire three players” in a recession, they bulldozed two parks for their taxpayer-funded boondoggle stadium, and A-Rod “with or without steroids… hits a remarkable number of home runs in meaningless situations… there is good reason for a fan to sit out this season.” He says Mets fans have reasons to sit as well, but does not understand that we are accustomed to failure and incompetence, whereas Yankee supporters evidently have to go through a few more years of it before they acquire our sangfroid. Play ball!

"More than any other contemporary African-American athlete, his ability to thrive in the pressure cooker of corporate America, while never making any embarrass­ing 'I’m not black, I’m universal' comments or selling his soul rather than just his visage, makes him a role model"

“Though his work for human rights is unassailable, the books grow worse and worse, the tales of his derring-do more and more farfetched. Finally, without at all forgiving him his lies, one feels sorry for Kosinski.”